


The Days Were Bright Red

by trajectory



Category: The Transformers (IDW Generation One), Transformers - All Media Types
Genre: Background Canon-Typical Misery, Class Issues, Developing Relationship, Familial Quarrels, Idealism, M/M, Pre-War
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-07
Updated: 2020-07-07
Packaged: 2021-03-05 04:54:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,406
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25128823
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/trajectory/pseuds/trajectory
Summary: Needlenose and Horri-Bull grow closer, while Needlenose and Tracks’ relationship crumbles apart.
Relationships: Horri-Bull/Needlenose (Transformers)
Comments: 6
Kudos: 14





	The Days Were Bright Red

**Author's Note:**

> Set on Cybertron before the war. Unbeta'd.
> 
> Along with the above tags, this story contains people not realizing how wrong their revolution will go in the future and running away from home. It makes references to Functionism, classism, and anti-beastformer attitudes. Reading the lead-up fic to this _A Map With Your Name For A Capital_ isn’t necessary to know what’s happening, but its events will be mentioned.

Horri-Bull worked long hours at the construction site, but he found time for hanging out off-shift with Needlenose when he could and once he shared his address, meet-ups were even easier. Sometimes Needlenose would wind up staying out a little longer than he intended, so a comm message went zinging off to Tracks to alert him to not stay up for him.

And honestly, Needlenose felt justified in his lack of repentance about occasionally not telling Tracks where he was going and staying out late or the incidents when he forgot the comm message.

How many times had Tracks gone out all night to go clubbing at Dancriton with his best friend Blaster? How many times had Tracks, soaking up attention, kept hours that were less than respectable and not said a word about it to Needlenose? Needlenose didn’t owe his brother a blow-by-blow live update of how he spent his days out of the house.

After the exhibition, more customers in the upper shopping district came to their doors and revenue from sales at their shop visibly improved, which put a bounce in the steps of both siblings. Selling Chic Chips was a modest business at the moment, but they were making more than enough to cover the production costs while still bringing in a profit.

Being the one who coded all of the designs, Needlenose determined what supplies needed to be bought in what quantities and turned those supplies into the rows of Chic Chip products lining the shelves. Tracks was the one in charge of bookkeeping, tallying up sales made, receipts sent, and transactions completed, to whom and by the end of which day, on top of marketing and building a customer base. Needlenose didn’t understand the ins-and-outs of marketing, so he left overseeing the ledger and the brand in Tracks’ hands.

This meant Tracks had more important matters to spare processor power on than Needlenose’s new friend, whom Tracks held in slight esteem to begin with.

Further reinforcing this, Needlenose and Horri-Bull ran in different social circles. Needlenose’s daylight hours were preoccupied with Sunbeam, Tracks, and the string of mechs who came in tow with Blaster, like Hound and Hoist, though Blaster and Hound were more Tracks’ friends than his. Expanding his small circle, Sunbeam was acquainted with Zigzag, a fellow gunformer and an otherwise rather friendless minibot who lived in the same neighborhood as Tracks and Needlenose. Zigzag had been kicked out of a militia, and worked as a roadside mechanic’s assistant at a towing company, responding to car accidents and pedestrian collisions. It was Sunbeam’s self-imposed mission to make Zigzag go outside and interact with others instead of watching yet another rerun of last year’s Ibex Cup on the newsfeed service with the window shutters closed and the door locked. As a consequence, Zigzag could be convinced to tag along with Needlenose and Sunbeam.

Amidst the faces Needlenose picked out from the rough-and-tumble crowd that congregated on Horri-Bull’s side of town, he spotted Apeface—Horri-Bull’s surly roommate, it turned out—as one of the mechs hanging around during a few of Needlenose’s visits, but Hightower, Kreb, and Buckethead also made regular appearances in the housing tenement where Horri-Bull’s apartment was. Sunbeam and Kreb didn’t get along, but Zigzag and Kreb did. More than once, Needlenose glanced over to see Apeface talking in a low voice with unfamiliar people who had serious faces and came and went in the evenings. The interaction struck Needlenose as a bit odd.

Some of the mechs from the manual class who hung around in the neighborhood had the same symbol branded on their plating as Horri-Bull and Apeface. Hightower did. Buckethead did.

They called themselves _Decepticons_.

The designation “Megatron” was heavy on the tip of more than one glossa, spoken with the same admiring tones in which Horri-Bull had first said it to him at the exhibition. Not that admiration was the sole emotion the name evoked: there were mechs who said it scornfully and one or two who regarded its owner with the gloomy resignation of people who didn’t like what they were seeing, but had no other options to root for. Sometimes others were named—a “Soundwave” and a “Starscream”—but not as frequently as Megatron was. They got lost in the din. Everybody talked at once, hollering at each other, carrying energon cubes around, knocking people into the couches, dropping trash where trash shouldn’t be, pushing and shoving around the rickety tables. Needlenose couldn’t remember a visit to the tenement when it wasn’t in a state of chaos.

Needlenose’s shadow passed over the tenement’s roof as he rode the air currents in alt mode, swooping a wide circle before he transformed to land in front of a side door.

Buckethead was loitering nearby, alone for once. Needlenose’s arrival got an engine rumble. Horri-Bull was no outlier when it came to his employment. Most bots here had industrial jobs that demanded long hours of labor for low wages and short breaks. The daily chaos was in a lull during the middle of the work day. But it was Horri-Bull’s free day. He’d be here. Needlenose ambled inside to seek him out.

He located him by honing in on the sounds of him and Kreb having an argument.

Kreb had broken the television in Horri-Bull’s room, which meant playing two-person video games on it like they planned was out of the question. Hightower had to be commed to drive over from two blocks away and fix it (not like the landlord would pay for it.)

Needlenose cleared out a spot between piles of clutter to sit down and watched Horri-Bull root around in the mess (which Needlenose loudly reminded Horri-Bull that he could stand to tidy up if he wanted to find his belongings faster) in his room. Horri-Bull unearthed a small crate. At this point, Hightower whirled away from where he’d been fiddling with the circuit board and told them both to pipe down and _move it_ or he’d take the television and break it over Needlenose’s helm. In the interest of preserving the television, Needlenose beat Horri-Bull in a speedy retreat.

They left the apartment. Outside a shop within walking distance that sold spare tires and replacement parts for grounders, they sat down.

The smell of fresh whipped energon cream filtered down the crooked side street from the restaurant next door to it. That was where they had purchased their lunch from. For a change, Horri-Bull had insisted on secrecy. Needlenose was curious as to why. He had an inkling that it had to do with the crate Horri-Bull was carrying under his arm.

Horri-Bull tipped out a pile of beaten-up datapads onto the table. Two had cracked screens and one of them was missing half of its original outer casing, the top half having been replaced with grey iron.

Needlenose picked one up.

“What are these?”

“They’re Megatron’s writing thingies!” Horri-Bull shout-whispered. “Or my copies, anyway. Since you showed me that design exhibition cuz’ you wanted me to get why design was important to you, I’m returning the favor. This is what’s important to me.”

“His essays?” Needlenose said and flipped it over in his hand, sunlight gleaming over the web of cracks splintering the glass. He booted the datapad up. The title appeared. _Towards Peace_. A crack cut right through _Peace_. No wonder Horri-Bull had been so secretive. The Senate would be more than happy to arrest people found with copies of Megatron’s rhetoric, much less his full manifesto.

“I read ‘em online. He makes a lot of sense.” Horri-Bull then paused. “Eh, except some of his early stuff was kinda wishy-washy, you know? _After The Ark_ , he kept going on about pacifism and _talking things out_ in that one.” He slurped from his fuel. “His newer essays are much better.”

The words on the screen glowed.

Behind his mask, Needlenose chewed on his lower lip thoughtfully.

Horri-Bull had given Needlenose a chance to make a case for why his art was worth something beyond looking good. It meant the world to Needlenose that he’d been taken seriously. It would be only right to give Horri-Bull the same chance in return. And nothing he’d heard about Megatron from the rest of the crowd at the tenement painted the miner in _too_ bad a light. Horri-Bull was inspired by him. Reading his essays couldn’t hurt.

“You’re not into nonviolence as a Decepticon tactic?” he asked, keeping his voice low.

“Nope!” Horri-Bull snorted. “The people up top, they ain’t gonna give up power just cuz’ we ask _real_ nicely or make an argument for it. Naw, if we want change, the kind that sticks, we’re gonna have to take it with a blaster.”

“The people _up top_ have a lot more blasters than you guys do, and plenty more training,” Needlenose pointed out reasonably. Horri-Bull made a disgruntled noise. Needlenose asked, “Is it okay if I download these copies to read or are you lending me the datapads? I’d prefer a download. Tracks might get on my case if I leave things that don’t belong to me laying around the house where he can trip across it.”

“A download’s fine. Promise there’s no viruses on the ‘pad.”

“Uh-huh.” Needlenose moved his lunch aside, unspooling his connector cable and plugging it into a port at the bottom of the datapad he was holding. A notification prompting him to accept the upload of new files blinked in his internal HUD: he did, and a red progress bar tracking how much data was coming in replaced the notification. It was a hefy file size, for just one datapad. Needlenose glanced at the rest of the pile that had been tipped onto the table. “Looks like I got a reading backlog that’ll last me for the next week.”

Horri-Bull smacked a hand on the table. “Hey, if _I_ can slog through ‘em, you can too! You’ve got those book smarts.”

After he had gotten home and finished his work (ugh, he hated carrying things around) for the day, Needlenose locked himself in his berthroom. One essay, Needlenose promised himself as he settled on his recharge slab and opened the first file on his HUD. He’d read one essay, get a sense for what this Megatron was talking about, and then he’d recharge.

Needlenose stayed up the rest of the night to read them all.

**////**

His workshop was in a backroom in the shop. Needlenose had a table under the circular window in his berthroom for drawing out the preliminary sketches and crafting mock-ups for test-runs and quality checks, but the Chic Chips they sold, he made right on-site. It eliminated the hassle of transporting them from the house to the shop.

Operating on too little sleep from sequential nights up late reading, Needlenose’s mind wasn’t on what his hands were doing. That wasn’t much of an issue. He’d scrutinized this design back and front. He could’ve made it in his recharge. He just needed to finish this batch of chips before tomorrow. If every micro-circuit was integrated properly, he’d have double the space for the coding libraries of color palettes without increasing power demand.

A door slid open. Magnifying lens clipped over one of his optics and an engraving tool in his hand, Needlenose glanced up.

Tracks walked in, a pleased expression plastered over his features.

“The shop sign in the front’s fixed now. I _told_ you, it was just a malfunctioned transistor.”

Needlenose shrugged. “Er. Great. Good job.” The magnifying lens came off easily; Needlenose set it down on the table and stretched leisurely, stiffened joints creaking and popping at the action. He put the engraving tool down. The joints between his fingers clicked. “I need a break. Could you give me a hand with my chips for a moment?”

“The new batch?” Tracks’ brow creased. “Is something wrong with it?”

“No, it’s fine. I want to test out its hardlight projection. Take it for a spin?” Needlenose asked, plucking a chip off the table and holding it out to Tracks.

Tracks’ field brightened. “Oh! Heh. You don’t need to ask me twice.”

He snapped back the panel cover on his forearm and pushed the chip into the port underneath. His optics glazed over for a moment as he accessed the chip’s functions.

And because Tracks was a show-off who loved to preen, Needlenose (having a similar weakness) noted fondly, he raised his spoilers high and struck an elegant pose just as his paintjob morphed from solid blue to a gradient of pink that gently lightened into pulsing white. Glowing lines traced along the contours of his biolights. It was flashy. One of the uses of the new design. Anybody who ran a basic scan on a mech while the chip was switched on would be able to tell it was a projection, not _real_ paint, but Needlenose was proud of seeing his art in action regardless.

Needlenose applauded. “Sweet!”

Tracks snapped his fingers. “Damn right it is. I make everything look good.”

Needlenose rolled his optics at him.

“Okay, try some other combos, Tracks. I put a lot of pre-programmed ones on there for customers to use. I don’t want glitches.”

After Tracks had cycled through many of the poses in his repertoire and turned himself into everything from black and silver to a blinding yellow studded with metallic sparkles, he stopped with a cry, hands planted on his hips, at the latest color palette. “Polka dots? Multi-colored moving _polka dots_? Is this a joke, Needlenose?”

“Some ‘bots from the boonies think they’re neat,” Needlenose defended his whimsy.

“Polka dots are a crime against fashion,” Tracks jested. “And we’re not selling to ‘bots from the boonies. Pay attention to our target audience. How am I supposed to market polka dots to shoppers in the district?”

“Same way you market everything else we have on the shelves? Can’t a country mech enjoy a Chic Chip just as much as a senator?”

Tracks heaved a theatrical sigh, removing the chip from his port and returning it to Needlenose’s hand. “And this, dear little brother, is why I’m the one who handles the customers and our business’ bottom line.”

Needlenose lined the chip up with the rest of the chips he had finished, his demeanor souring. “Right... “

“Aw, don’t get in a mood, Needle.”

“I’m not in a mood!”

“You so are!” Tracks said. Pulling up a stool to the table where Needlenose sat, he reached out with his field to touch the edges of Needlenose’s field, confidence and light-heartedness washing through it. “Listen, we can expand our clientele once we’ve firmly broken into the market. Chips for everybody, that’ll be in the future, since you won’t let up on it. But right _now_ , we need to specialize our appeal towards the ‘bots who can afford our _current_ prices. Like Decanus. The elite won’t think of polka dots as keeping up with the times. Shop upkeep and our living expenses, they all cost shanix. We’re beginners. Do you know how many start-up enterprises fail? We can’t cater to everybody.”

“I’m still not in a mood—!” Needlenose protested.

“ _Sure_ you’re not,” Tracks teased, talking over him.

The jet sputtered, unconvinced, even as his brother’s words brought up the goal they had both agreed to aim for: financial success so shining they could open a shop in the capital too, maybe even be commissioned by members of the Prime’s inner circle. Tracks had been tireless in educating himself in business so two lone mechs like them would be able to stand strong and never end up grubbing in the gutters for fuel. “—Fine. I know… We need a target audience. You’re right, I just—I wish it wasn’t like that. I wish we don’t have to do it like this, making them cost so much just to keep the shop going.”

“That’s life,” Tracks said, clapping him on the shoulder. “Cheer up. Once we’ve rocked the fashion world, we can create chips in any way we want!”

“Okay, okay...”

Needlenose busied himself sweeping the chips into a storage container.

Tracks blithely moved the conversation along. “Anyway, _Attack of the Alien Organics II_ came out today.”

“Which one is that?”

“The new movie by Arcanus of Teledonia,” Tracks said. “I bought a download. Do you want to call it a day early and come watch it with me?”

“Um. Sorry, I can’t. I already got plans. I’m going out,” Needlenose stammered.

“Where are you going?” His brother asked, raising an optical ridge.

“I already said. Out.” Needlenose repeated.

Tracks pulled his field away.

“Oh yeah? As, _out_ with that new pal of yours and his friends?”

Needlenose flicked a wing sharply. “And what if it was?”

If Tracks didn’t like Horri-Bull, fair was fair. After their first meeting where Needlenose had tried to introduce them to each other, Horri-Bull didn’t hide that he disliked Tracks either.

“Then I’d say it’s one change I’m not a fan of. Used to be you never turned down a movie night.” Tracks folded his arms across his chassis. “I’m saying this because I’m concerned. I’m just trying to look out for you. Family comes first, remember?”

For a moment, Needlenose was annoyed, but his blue optics softened. “Family’s important. I haven’t forgotten that.”

How could he?

Their lives had been ignited in the same hot spot.

Like all Cybertronian siblings, they had begun as a single spark but they had split almost the instant after full emergence into two separate sparks, before they had even condensed the soft, pale murk of birth metal around them into protoform. The early timing was common—it was incredibly rare for the spark to split into two late in its development. That was how one got a branched spark. The later the split, the greater probability for it.

Needlenose and Tracks weren’t a branched spark. What they shared was their spark bond, their spark type, and a handful of physical traits. If one died, the other could survive.

Needlenose privately believed they’d been meant to come out as a matched pair of jets except Tracks’ spark had other ideas. He’d wanted wheels, yet could not give up the sky.

“You’re getting worried over nothing,” Needlenose brushed it off. “Horri-Bull’s good company. He’s not dangerous. You just haven’t given him a chance. Save your concern for the shop.” Tracks had been harvested first so he acted like this made him the responsible and wiser brother by default, like it was his job to take the lead and look after Needlenose.

Though he hadn’t admitted it, Needlenose was getting tired of being treated as somebody in need of coddling.

**////**

The Decepticons didn’t coddle him.

“Want to come to one of our meetings?” Horri-Bull had offered, very earnestly. “We’re having a rally in two days, in the plaza. If you come, you can see the cause is all about in action. I know you read Megatron’s stuff, but it’s not the same. You’ll see what the Decepticons are for!”

In the middle of discussing the files he’d downloaded from Horri-Bull’s datapads, he’d told Horri-Bull of his hopes to one day do well enough with his skills to get himself reclassified from the flight class into being a member of the artisan class, and Horri-Bull had said he was thinking about it the wrong way. He’d pointed to Megatron’s essays.

Why should Needlenose be locked into one job just because he had been created with a flying alt mode? Why should his function be more important than his right to choose? Shouldn’t everybody have occupational freedom? Horri-Bull thought it was a load of rustwash that he’d gotten a lousy dead-end job foisted on him as his calling in life solely because of his strong frame and beast alt mode. Needlenose was thinking in terms of the social hierarchy. But if the Decepticons _ripped down_ the social hierarchy and smashed it and the weaklings who supported it to bits, everybody would be free to be who they wanted to be.

And the longer Needlenose was around the tenement, the more he saw where Horri-Bull was coming from.

Kreb the forklift wanted to be a newscaster. Hightower the crane truck liked building things, but he wanted to work with computers and chemical equations, not low-end warehouses and crummy bricks: he wanted the prestige his lowly place in the system wouldn’t grant him. Buckethead the frontloader wanted to be a star in the theater.

Krunk the roller was a lazy ‘bot who liked dice games and watching gladiator matches more than doing the work he was paid for, but given the choice, he’d pick working on the waterways over yet another dusty demolition job where he got dirt in his joints. Cement-Head and Terror-Tread the drillers had no plans but they wanted to ditch their alt modes, get rebuilds, and go experiment with their lives.

The mecha on this side of town were angry. It wasn’t too far of a drive to go from the tenement to the slums, where disposables and Empties peered around corners at interlopers with wary optics.

They weren’t like Needlenose, who had a government license and worked at his shop out of passion.

Needlenose had options.

They had none.

Needlenose followed Horri-Bull to the rally, processor jumbled up with information. He thought about the costs of changing the world and going to jail and the housing blocks that had been knocked down to make room for the exhibition site.

And by the first speech boomed at the audience, Needlenose was hooked.

 _As a miner once said to the Senator putting the boot on his back, the Senate will take and take until they’re forced to_ stop _—and these_ parasites _label us scum, good only for carting materials and slaving in dark tunnels, but if you can swing a pickaxe, you can lift a gun, and the Senate’s going to find out that we’re good for more than what they say our function is!_

The other Decepticons didn’t disperse right away after the rally ended.

Horri-Bull supplied names of other regulars in the audience, matching them with their owners—the blue and white jet Apeface was chatting up was Slugslinger, one of the movement’s arms suppliers for the area; the twitchy, spastic-looking one with double cannons mounted on his shoulders and a wild gleam in his orange visor was Triggerhappy (no, Needlenose, he didn’t know who let a guy with a designation like that have shoulder cannons either); Squeezeplay was a beastformer who did recruiting from the lower classes in the slums, which was probably why Dreadwing (the big bomber plane, over there, can’t miss him, armored like a warframe) was talking to him. Must want to know where some of the newcomers were coming from.

Another member of the audience pitifully asked Needlenose if he had a spray bottle of cleanser on him, since he’d emptied his own bottle. Needlenose admitted he didn’t.

Rubbing at plating that already looked spotless with gloved hands, the mech clicked and introduced himself as Windsweeper. “They have to operate underground, to avoid arrest, I recognize that. The organizers can’t be choosy. But the locations for the rallies are so often so… so…!”

“Out of the way?” Needlenose suggested.

“Filthy!” Windsweeper shuddered. “The stains. The leaks. I have to take a shower and disinfect myself for two hours afterwards each time I attend one!”

“What, ‘cuz ya’ think you need a good scrubbing after mingling with the ‘bots that live here?” Horri-Bull sneered, offended.

Windsweeper drew himself up, red and white plating fluffed out. “Don’t put words in my mouth! I said nothing like that! It’s not the people, it’s these _surroundings_.”

Needlenose nudged Horri-Bull in the side. “Cool it. He didn’t mean it as a put-down.” Horri-Bull’s temper subsided. Needlenose turned to the other jet and asked, “If attending grosses you out so much, why come?” His optics paused on Windsweeper’s chest. “You don’t have the brand.”

“Neither do you,” Windsweeper responded, jutting his chin at Needlenose’s chest. Needlenose’s cheeks colored. Windsweeper dragged a hand down his face. “It doesn’t just... ‘gross me out,’ and it’s not just here. It’s… Never mind. None of your business. I’m here because I believe in the same Cause as the rest of us.” He gestured at the buildings hemming the edges of the plaza. “No place where modern Cybertronians live ought to be this dirtied, not when we have technology and the means to clean it up. I’m in charge of the sanitation systems for Translucenica Heights. We have the tech to fix this. It’s not being _used._ It’s wrong that mechs are forced to stay in _slums_.”

Realizing he’d treaded on touchy ground for Windsweeper, Needlenose backed off. “Your conviction is admirable.”

“Translucenica Heights is in Iacon,” Horri-Bull said. “Not what _I’d_ call Decepticon-friendly territory.”

Windsweeper picked at invisible dirt on his plating. “Before the Senate silenced him, I was an associate of Senator Momus. I picked it up from him. Our politics aligned. I’m carrying on the fight in his stead.” He chuckled. “Secretly. That goes without saying. As far as my current employers know, I’m on a long, relaxing vacation in Ibex right now. I’d get fired if they found out about my sympathies!”

Uncomfortably, Needlenose suddenly wondered how Tracks would react if he discovered Needlenose had gone to a Decepticon rally.

**////**

There were two cassettes lounging in Needlenose’s spot on the sofa. Steeljaw was curled up into a burnished golden circle, undersized wings tucked over his back as he purred. Sprawled upside-down, paws in the air, Stripes was a brick orange noodle of a cat with black patterns streaking over his flanks. Unlike Steeljaw, he snored, jaw hanging open to expose a mouthful of sharp fangs. He smelled like engex. His carrier hadn’t curbed that fondness for alcohol.

A cube in his hand that he had stood up to refill with coolant, Needlenose glared, the lower edge of his optic twitching.

In the cooking area, their carrier was talking to Tracks and Sunbeam about radio shows. Blaster had driven from Triax to visit them and past experience dictated the reporter and his cohort would be staying over for the next several days.

With his previous seat stolen, Needlenose headed into the other room to sit with Beachcomber.

One of Blaster’s many friends, Beachcomber had accompanied Blaster when he came to visit the brothers. He was writing the second edition of his book on reinterpreting certain Primalist religious texts in accordance to his personal faith. This meant he was prone to reading out snippets of his work aloud to the nearest person and asking for their critique if they agreed to give him feedback.

If he had to pick a single bot from Blaster’s entourage, Needlenose liked talking to Beachcomber the most.

It helped that Beachcomber was happy to give Needlenose tips on what he considered the most popular design trends among the students on the academy campus he was living next to. Beachcomber was too gentle to hurt a scraplet, let alone snap at anybody for asking questions.

Beachcomber was scribbling on a datapad and Needlenose had his nose in one of Beachcomber’s drafts when Hoist joined them by limping into the room and heaving himself down into a seat. Hoist hadn’t planned to stop by, simply intending to drive with Blaster and Beachcomber on their way from Triax and continue onward to Ibex while they stopped at Rodion.

A punctured tire and a damaged foot joint on the highway outside of Rodion had short-circuited that plan. Tracks had offered him a guest room to crash in and let his self-repair handle it.

As long as he didn’t have to share his berthroom, Needlenose didn’t object. Let Hoist room with Blaster and his cassettes. If they had other people around the house, it would be even easier to go and meet Horri-Bull without Tracks noticing his absence.

**////**

Horri-Bull didn’t mind getting grubby or lifting things or carrying things or breaking things. Mark him down for being eager to show off his strength. He just wildly resented everybody who treated him like he was lesser for doing it. Being a mech with a fuse shorter than a matchstick, that resentment easily erupted into physical violence. The first time Needlenose got into a real fight, it’d been because he had been helping Squeezeplay and Horri-Bull tack up flyers before a meeting and a group of hecklers had strolled past. ”Animals,” one sneered. Another made an insulting gesture with three of his fingers and mimicked a techanimal squealing. “Having fun asking for real mechs to come to your little purple club?”

Horri-Bull transformed immediately, his hooves slamming into the pavement. He tossed his helm, horns slicing through the air, abruptly aggressive. “Ya’ think you’re better than me, just 'cuz you got wheels, coward? Ya’ think you’re the bigger mech? Want a FIGHT, do you?”

He didn’t wait for a retort before he charged them.

Needlenose caught the pack of flyers he’d thrown aside before they scattered. “Squeezeplay, watch ou—”

Already transformed, Squeezeplay was lunging at the group.

Frozen as Squeezeplay’s eerie shrieking echoed off the buildings and Horri-Bull tried to gore somebody, Needlenose blanked on a course of action.

Then one of the hecklers punched him.

The same heckler who had made the insulting gesture.

Needlenose punched him back, _hard_.

After that, he ran to help Horri-Bull put the mech he was thrashing in his place.

They swaggered into the meeting late, Needlenose sporting a thin crack in an optic and a bruised cheek, Horri-Bull with a dent on his shoulder, and Squeezeplay unmarked. Needlenose barely cared. He was smiling so wide it hurt. It felt good to win at something.

**////**

Tracks’s attitude that he knew better than Needlenose when it came to prices and chip production had annoyed him before, just not so much that Needlenose had ever bothered to voice his irritation with it aloud. Now it _grated_ , that Tracks didn’t ask for his feedback—not as a designer or as his business partner—before publicly announcing they would be rolling out a new line of chips that Needlenose hadn’t been consulted on, or dropping a Chic Chip design from the shelves that Needlenose favored and considered worth continuing, once it fell out of fashion in favor of something more trendy. Needlenose had only found out about the design being discontinued the same day their customers did when he checked the website for their shop.

Was it so much to ask that Tracks look away from patting his own back in the mirror and towards something else—like his own brother’s opinions?

Tracks claimed family was his first priority.

So why wouldn’t his brother take what Needlenose believed seriously?

If family came first, Tracks should be _supporting_ him in challenging the government instead saying stuff like “Horri-Bull’s just another one of those Decepticon fanatics,” and “the way you say they talk about their head honcho, they sound like a cult.” Needlenose had demanded he cut it out with the accusations. The ensuing disagreement left the atmosphere and the spark bond between them clogged with awkwardness.

In a stab at smoothing over the issue, they flew the next day to where Blaster lived in Triax, with its busy airspace and tall communication towers.

Steeljaw greeted them at the front door. Blaster had been called away on a tip, taking Stripes with him.

Blaster was on the trail of a major scoop for a news story. Political corruption, a hidden scandal, possible dead bodies, bribes paid to the enforcers, the whole five yards. The brothers weren’t the only ones visiting him and his cohort. Hound was too. Sturdy and reliable, Hound was a former member of the Primal Vanguard and ready to offer protection from people who might try to silence a journalist. He was helping Blaster with his investigation. Both of them welcomed Tracks and Needlenose warmly. The group spent the day out at the racetracks and whiled away the evening at a moderately popular cafe.

Tracks didn’t bring up the chip prices and Needlenose didn’t say a word about Horri-Bull.

They don’t argue.

But when they flew back to the house a week later, Needlenose didn’t feel the gulf between them had shrunk in the slightest. Frustration gnawed at him.

**////**

Horri-Bull was who had taught Needlenose how to throw a good punch.

“Because your punches suck and it’ll lose you fights if nobody’s there to back you up,” Horri-Bull had said tactlessly when Needlenose had asked for a reason behind the lessons. “We can’t have your pretty face busted up again.” The grey stretch of pavement behind the tenement smelled like used cygar smoke. Adopting a fighting stance, Horri-Bull invited Needlenose to wind up and sock him.

“Is _this_ the best way to go about teaching?” Needlenose was complaining and he knew it. He did it anyway.

“Gotta frag up before we can figure out what you’re doing wrong and correct it,” Horri-Bull informed him gleefully, the slagger. “Go on. Hit me.”

Needlenose did, connecting with his jaw. His hand sent a starburst of pain ricocheting up his sensor network and into his processor. He jumped backwards, wringing his hand and biting down on his glossa in order to not swear.

Horri-Bull just rolled his neck back on his shoulders. The blow hadn’t bothered him.

“First, don’t put your thumb inside your fist, it’ll screw it up,” Gripping his hand in both of his large hands so that he could make adjustments, Horri-Bull uncurled Needlenose’s fingers and re-folded them into a fist. “Keep it outside and under your fingers, like that. Ya’ wanna to punch with your knuckles, not your palm.”

With Horri-Bull bent over to bring their helms together, his familiar stench overpowering the lingering reek of cygars, Needlenose could gaze into his optics when he spoke. “Like this?” He made a fist with his uncovered hand.

“Close. Keep your wrist straight.”

“... Like this?”

“Better. Now try again.”

“Can’t we get a sand bag for this?”

Horri-Bull laughed.

“Who’s teaching who here? Not you. Tell ya’ what, get ‘ta the point where you can punch me hard enough it hurts, without me needin’ to check your stance and I’ll steal Terror-Tread’s punching bag from his room for the rest.”

“It’s a deal.”

**////**

It was a minor operation to get the lens of one’s optics changed to a different color. They were Cybertronians and optic changes didn’t have to be permanent if one didn’t want it to be.

Red optics were popular among the Decepticons.

When Needlenose came home with his optics modified to bright red, he looked hopefully at Tracks for his reaction.

Tracks clicked his glossa, and said airily, “Going with something new? It makes you look like a tryhard. It goes nicely with your paintjob at least.”

Needlenose’s mask didn’t hide his shift from hopeful to disappointed. “Just because you’re happy with what we were onlined with doesn’t mean I have to be!”

He stormed off.

Bewildered, Tracks stared after him.

(What Tracks pretended he didn’t feel was hurt that his spark brother had decided blue was wanting in comparison to red.

It felt like a rejection, and Tracks could only cover the sting with a coating of vanity, by disregarding the growing distance between them as something temporarily brought on by a silly fad Needlenose had tripped into. The shine of its novelty would wear off soon and Needlenose would stop wagging his wings whenever that big idiot paid attention to him and changing bits of himself to match the idiot and talking nonstop about ideas from some miner, and he would go back to normal.)

**////**

By any stretch of the imagination, it wasn’t a crime to be young and overeager and freshly stumbling into love. The problem was—it was not a _crime_ , but it _was_ quite an unfortunate thing to be that wrenchingly young and dancing on the balls of your feet to find some cause to burn yourself up in.

**////**

Needlenose plowed down the street, Horri-Bull following him behind.

“So,” Horri-Bull said, having only caught the tailend of what Needlenose had been shouting at Tracks as he stomped out of the shop after their quarrel. “Take it that the talk went bad?”

Needlenose spat, “He never listens to me. Why would he start now? And I’m _sick_ of putting up with it. Afthole.”

“That’s it then.”

“Yeah,” Needlenose said savagely, and pretended the hot pressure building up behind his optics was just from righteous anger. He threw his hands up in the air. “If Tracks doesn’t care about anything but having his own way about _everything_ and shanix, and buffing his paint job and getting a new topcoat, and, and, that’s fine. If he thinks I’m just his dumb little brother who’s got his head in the clouds, then _fine_! He can run the business by himself! He’ll think twice when there’s nobody to make Chic Chips for him! We’re done. I’m through with him.”

Horri-Bull patted him on the back, thick fingers resting on the red glass of his cockpit. “Sorry he put you in that position. You’re better off without him, Needlenose. He was just dead weight holding you back.”

Needlenose’s engine hitched. He made a fist.

“I’m joining the Decepticons.”

Horri-Bull looked confused. “But ya’ already did.”

“No, that’s not what I meant,” Needlenose shook his helm. He pointed a finger at his chest plating. “I want to join _properly_. It’s about time I took the Decepticon brand.”

Horri-Bull and Needlenose stopped at the house, to pick up Needlenose’s belongings and pack them away into their subspaces and what they couldn’t fit in there, Horri-Bull and Needlenose carried away in their arms. As they went about the task of stripping his room bare, Needlenose deleted each increasingly frantic message from Tracks as they piled up in his inbox.

He should probably just go to the source of the problem and delete Tracks’ frequency from his comms and his comm device altogether. The comm device first then. Pulling it out as they walked down the street, he navigated to Tracks’ contact information. His finger hovered indecisively over the removal button.

Yet another message popped up on the screen, its subject line reading ‘ _Needlenose: You’re Making A Mistake. I Swear We Can Talk This Through. Call Me Back. Please._ ’

Needlenose’s finger went down, deleting the frequency.

**Author's Note:**

> 1\. Tracks isn’t a bad guy here, just somewhat overbearing and ignorant. Please remember for the duration of this fic, he’s mostly seen from the subjective POV of his idealistic and sheltered younger brother who got introduced to his first taste of revolutionTM, fell in love with somebody Tracks isn’t impressed by, and is probably in the throes of the Cybertronian version of acting out his personal familial rebellion.
> 
> 2\. Related to the above, please note that whenever Needlenose reacts like Horri-Bull is hot, he’s in love and beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Objectively speaking Horri-Bull is… not a looker. Unless you like them big, not gifted in the brains department, and mean?


End file.
